Mayor Bob Baines sits in his office before heading off to an early evening finance committee meeting.
As Baines tells it, this meeting is a perfect example of the difference between the fury of the democratic presidential primary unfolding outside city hall and the race he’s in.
12:23 partisan politics does not belong in city elections, I always run a campaign with one republican and one democrat co-chair to demonstrate the fact that the issues that are important to the city are not divided along party lines, we’re all for fiscal responsibility, we’re all for economic development, we’re all for education, we’re all for fixing pot holes, and picking up garbage and plowing our streets
Technically, Manchester’s mayor’s race is completely non-partisan.
On primary day, all candidates show up on every ballot and the top two vote getters-from any party-go on to compete in the general election.
When voters go to the polls on September 16th, they will have a choice of seven contenders.
Two term incumbent Bob Baines is generally seen as the frontrunner.
Baines says he’s given the people of Manchester good service.
2:50 thousands of new jobs have been brought to the city of Manchester at a time when a lot of communities are losing jobs, we are actually growing jobs in the city, plus the school renovation project, 105 million investment in the infrastructure of our schools, the neglected maintenance of our schools will be a thing of the past
But Baines does face opposition
And while the race is nominally non-partisan, on the ground, party differences do matter.
1:18 …hi how are you my friend, I’m Carlos Gonzalez and I’m running for mayor….
Republican Carlos Gonzalez is a two term state representative.
He won the endorsement of the Manchester City Republican Organization and he has raised 20,000 dollars in only a few weeks.
Gonzalez has backing from big names like Republican Governor Craig Benson and Executive Councilor Ray Wierzorek.
To get his name out, he is going to every ward, knocking on doors.
Talking to a woman at her home on the city’s south side, he says his main goal is to cut taxes.
Track 5 2:45
Gonzalez: I am running on a fiscally responsible agenda, we need to put a hold on taxes, put a hold on the spending, it will come back and hound us
Woman: yes it will…
Gonzalez has run for city wide office twice before and has come up short both times.
He is the first Hispanic ever elected to the state house.
He was born in the Dominican Republic.
Gonzalez touts his immigrant roots and likes to compare himself to another Dominican Republic native-one well known to Red Sox fans across the city.
:06 I want to be the Pedro Martinez of the politics in Manchester, and I want to hit home run here in the city of Manchester and make a difference for the people of Manchester
Gonzalez’s baseball metaphor touches on one of the hot button issues in this race.
Mayor Baines recently struck a deal to bring minor league baseball to Manchester at a cost of 27.5 million dollars.
Carlos Gonzalez supports the costly project.
Many of his fellow Republicans don’t.
Republican candidate Jeff Kassell has been the most vocal in his opposition to baseball.
He and two other mayoral hopefuls spoke at a recent GOP Spaghetti dinner.
5:42 The leadership in this city has been obsessed with building multi-million dollar venues for sporting events and entertainment over the past few years and have pretty much ignored basic infrastructure and by infrastructure I mean streets which are turning to rubble
Kassell’s appearance at the Republican event highlighted an interesting dimension of Manchester politics-Kassell used to be a democrat.
This year’s race is dotted with party switchers.
Candidate Howie Howe-former libertarian, now republican-also spoke.
37:03 we have chased out thousands of industrial paying jobs, good industrial paying jobs and replaced them with jobs flipping burgers and minimum wages and we want to pat ourselves on the back, well guess what bob, it’s a bunch of crap because a guy who’s making minimum wage probably came to this city looking for the American dream and what he found was the American minimum wage instead and now he can’t even afford to get out of town…laughs…applause…
Neither Howe nor Kassell have ever held elected office.
Howe has the additional political burden of having plead guilty to sexual assault.
The mayor’s race has an independent—Bob Shaw.
Shaw by the way is a former democrat and a former Republican.
Two decades ago, as a Republican, he was the Mayor of Manchester.
He reminded his audience that he has experience leading the city.
9:11 I am the same Bob Shaw that served you twenty years ago, the only difference is I’ve grown a lot wiser and a lot poorer from paying my unfair share of the cities taxes
On the democratic side, Baines has two opponents.
Jane Beaulieu served on the conservation committee for 15 years and was its chair for 3 years.
Protecting Manchester’s open spaces and older buildings is her number one priority.
1:38 my concerns are the city in two years could end up looking like any other city in New England that has no character, historic preservation and land preservation is something that I feel very strong about and I don’t feel the planning department over the Mayors office is really working in a way that there is balance with the big boom in economic development.
Beaulieu’s last name could help her win some votes.
Her father, Emile, was once Mayor of Manchester.
Parenthetically, as mayor, he was a democrat.
Since then, he too, has changed parties.
Daniel Soucy rounds out the list of seven candidates.
However the 27 year old who works in a smoke shop by day and DJs at night, hasn’t had much time for campaigning.
City Democrats have put their weight behind Baines and feel good about their chances.
City party Chair Ray Buckley says the other candidates simply don’t have a chance.
12:27 you look at the other candidates who have decided to put their names on the ballot and its somewhat sad, its good on one level, because it is obviously gratifying to Mayor Baines and his record that no credible person has stepped forward but on the other side it really robs the people of Manchester of a really clear and coherent discussion on the future of the city
But city GOP chair Joe Kelly Levasseur says democrats are overconfident.
He says the low profile of GOP’s chosen candidate, Gonzalez, is deceptive.
16:40 we look at this as the Trojan horse, here’s our gift, you guys just like the gift and we’re gonna come out here and work, when you’re all sleeping we’re out there working.
No matter how hard Gonzalez works, he’ll have a hard time matching Baines’ war chest.
Gonzalez has raised around 20,000 dollars.
Baines is on his way to raising 100,000 dollars.
That effort will certainly get a boost this weekend when Boston’s Mayor Tom Menino hosts a fundraiser for Baines in Manchester.
Menino, by the way, is a democrat.
And always has been.
For NHPR news, I’m RK
